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Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Who's filling your prescriptions?

Do you ever take a second to consider the competency of the pharmacy staff responsible for filling your prescriptions.  Did it ever occur to you that some of the staff do not know the difference between an anti-hypertensive (blood pressure) medication and analgesic (pain) medication.  It's true!  I have seen it, time and time again!

So, why is this happening?  Is it cheap labor for the company?  Is it because they've been with the company for so long?  Well, I've formed an opinion about this, and it seems to me that certain pharmacies keep mediocre staff members on the payroll because of just that; cheap labor and longevity.

The way I see it, many of the technicians working in pharmacies lack the formal training necessary to make them a competent and effective pharmacy technician.  Although they may be "super-tech," when it comes to procedural tasks, they are clueless about drug indications, categories, side effects, and incompatibilities.  Yet and still they tend to run off most of the newcomers with intimidation; unless of course, intimidation does not work.  Then newcomers are typically labeled as "confrontational" or "difficult to work with,"  simply due to the expectation of excellence and compliance with statutes, regulations, and federal laws, sprinkled with the slightest bit of professionalism.

Regarding management/pharmacies, they must identify the dynamics of their workplace and maintain order and organization within the pharmacy.  In doing so, perhaps training opportunities may come about for technicians.  This may help turn a mediocre technician into a more competent technician, which may hopefully steer their focus from less important things (competition/ego) toward the mission at hand.  The mission should be to administer the correct medication to the correct patient at the correct time.

I could be wrong, but that's how I see it!

Looking forward to augmenting my 8+ years of experience as a Certified Pharmacy Technician with additional training from UF in Pharmaceutical Outcomes and Policy.  Yeah, I'm on the right track ;-)

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